There is a unique and elderly structure near the University of Denver campus that draws spectators all year round. The university’s Chamberlin Observatory celebrates 120 years of astronomical study this year. Its refracting telescope, a beautiful 20-inch Alvan Clark-Saegmuller device, dates from 1894.

The Observatory is on the National Register of Historic Places and is kept active on the community’s calendar by the Denver Astronomical Society’s monthly events. The Observatory is situated in Observatory Park, near DU, at 2930 East Warren Avenue, Denver. It is made of red sandstone, a typical material used for buildings of distinction at the time of its construction in 1890. A wealthy local donor, Humphrey B. Chamberlin, gave the initial funds for its establishment.

Aaron Reid, left, and DU graduate student Brian Kloppenborg make adjustments to the refractor telescope that is 120 years old in this 2010 photograph.

Interested astronomers can contact the Denver Astronomical Society for details of public and special events. An anniversary celebration will be held at the Observatory from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. on July 19. At 8:30 p.m. that night, an evening of star-gazing awaits all visitors attending the open house.

Snow-capped Chamberlin Observatory.

It’s a fascinating destination for all ages and a step back in time to Denver as it looked in the 19th Century. More importantly, the Observatory introduces new astronomers to the science. Below, five-year-old Aiden Miller of Littleton gazes through the 26-foot length of the Clark-Saegmuller telescope to get a view of Venus in its crescent phase in this 2009 photo.

Seventy years ago, the beaches of Normandy were the site of an invasion never before seen in history. The largest armada ever assembled made a secret crossing of the English Channel to storm Nazi defenses and force an end to World War II.

On June 6, 1944, the Allied D-Day invasion of German-occupied France began.

Operation Overlord was the largest amphibious military action ever attempted. The armada comprised of 5,000 vessels and 11,000 airplanes ferried 150,000 service men across the English Channel. Nine battleships, 23 cruisers, 104 destroyers and 71 large landing craft were further assisted by minesweepers, merchantmen, troop transports and other small craft.

In the photo at top, Supreme Allied Commander Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower gives the order of the day, “Full victory – nothing else” to paratroopers of the 101st Airborne Division at the Royal Air Force base in Greenham Common, England, hours before the men boarded their planes to participate in the first assault wave.

Utah.

Omaha.

Gold.

Juno.

Sword.

The beaches of Normandy, code-named for the planned invasion, were littered with nasty defenses.

Nazi defenses on Normandy beach.

This photo, beach unnamed, shows the extent of Nazi defenses on the shore. As Eisenhower later described it, “Since the Germans had filled the beaches with terrible obstacles, steel traps of every kind and had mined them to make them even more difficult to remove, we had to have low water, low tide that would give us time to clear the obstacles or at least pile through them so our landing craft could come in.”

American soldiers land in France. (AP photo)

And land they did. Operation Overlord did not go exactly to plan, but was considered a success, gaining the Allied Forces a foothold in northern Europe. The losses were tremendous, with 9,000 Allied troops wounded or killed in the storming of the heavily fortified beaches. In the photo below, American troops whose landing craft was sunk help a comrade to the shore.

American soldiers make landing in France.

At home, the invasion was big news. In Denver, the large, rarely used typeface shouted the news from the front page of The Denver Post in an extra edition on June 6, 1944. At that time, the newspaper was published in the afternoon. Note the line of marching flags in the headline…

Front page news, June 6, 1944

On the 70th anniversary of such momentous human sacrifice, the dead, wounded and missing are remembered.

Denver’s children obtained their early education at a red brick schoolhouse in the heart of the city. In 1889, the Dora Moore Elementary School opened at 846 Corona Street in Capitol Hill. Its original portion was designed by architect Robert Roeschlaub. Its distinctive onion domes and two and a half stories are still instantly recognizable by the generations of attendees. There was an addition made in 1909.

Students at work in 1970s.

The classrooms featured large blackboards seen in use above, where teachers wrote out assignments and lesson plans and students drew their exercizes. Chalk, erasers and rubber-tipped pointers were the tools of the day.

The interior of the school has been renovated, and the exterior saved from the ravages of time with major reconstruction projects. In 1975, students supported the nomination of Dora Moore Elementary as a local landmark. Its beloved edifice and classrooms held dear memories for students and parents alike. It was posted to the National Register of Historic Places on June 9, 1978.

Interior of Dora Moore Elementary in 1979.

It is the students, teachers, parents, administrators and staff of Dora Moore Elementary who make it such a viable community resource today. Denver’s oldest schoolhouse stands solidly as it passes its 125th year of existence.

Students on Safety Patrol.

Above, students on Safety Patrol wear jackets purchased by the PTA in 1964. They are Oscar Noriega, 13; Vicki Grady, 11; and Mac Moore, 11. Mrs. Norma Kowry was the patrol adviser.

Student readers prepare to chat books.

In the summer, Dora Moore students read books and gave skits to tell other students about their favorites. In costume, above, and with their principal, John Wilmore, were (from left) Wally Foster, Charles Buckley, Mary Hildebrand, Michael Powers, Patricia Eaton and Jean Olson. In 1963, the ‘vacation readers’ had to read eight books.

In 2014, the anniversary celebrations are ON. This video was captured by Denver Post videographer Karl Gehring:

And a time capsule was opened on March 15, 2014, in this video by Denver Post reporter Yesenia Robles:

The Denver Post is lucky enough to own copies of many of its past rotogravure and color newspaper sections. Most are viewable on microfilm, a stable way to store images. But to move further into the digital age, the sections we are enjoying in frames on the wall are being dismantled, photographed and digitized using an ingenious vacuum table.

Photographer Cyrus McCrimmon at work.

Denver Post photographer Cyrus McCrimmon is photographing each newspaper page by first flattening it on a vacuum table (literally using a vacuum attached to a table with holes drilled into the top). The camera, a Nikon D800, is mounted atop a copystand and connected to a computer. Cyrus controls the shot he will take, setting focus, exposure and composition before firing the camera through the computer.

Cyrus sets controls of the camera through a computer.

There are two strobe lights with lighting umbrellas positioned to even out the light source as a shot is taken.

The vacuum table.

Empire magazine sections readied for copying.

The Denver Post is also copying colorful graphics and advertising from the 1940s and 1950s, digitizing images for planned galleries. Working from the original newsprint pages ensures a high level of quality to the digitized images. We hope readers will enjoy these blasts from the past as much as we do.

At the settlement of Ludlow, near Trinidad, miners and their families huddle in a stark tent city. Because of the strike, they have been evicted from homes provided by the companies that employ the miners.

The tent city is about to become the site of a monumental eruption that will change U.S. labor relations forever.

* * *

In late 1913, the United Mine Workers of America organized a state-wide strike against Colorado’s biggest coal-producing companies, including Colorado Fuel & Iron Co. and the Rocky Mountain Fuel Co. Demands by the UMWA for better pay and working conditions for coal miners had gone unaddressed for years.

Coal mining is hard, dirty and dangerous work, but a hundred years ago, it was a big industry in Colorado, employing thousands of people. The industry had a high rate of worker deaths and few safeguards in place to correct that. The companies used guards to enforce strict rules on miners’ lives, effectively keeping them in serfdom.

In the midst of the strike, the coal companies used their guards to harass the strikers and protect substitute laborers, known as ‘scabs.’ There was even an armored car built by CF&I, in Pueblo, which had a machine gun mounted on it.

The strikers living in tents were occasionally fired on indiscriminately as part of the harassment. To protect their families, the striking miners dug pits below the platforms on which the tents sat to provide them further shelter.

Pits below the platforms…

* * *

The strike wears on.

Tensions are rising. Working men are pitted against armed company thugs.

The governor, Elias Ammons, calls in The Colorado National Guard to impose order. But the state recalls most of the Guard units in 1914, possibly for cost reasons. Then an ugly incident ends with retaliatory demolition of one of the tent enclaves, called Forbes camp.

The coal companies beef up security in the form of a militia made of their own hired guards put into National Guard uniforms.

Militia unloading supplies at Trinidad depot in 1913.

On the morning of April 20, a confusing series of events lead to an all-out gun battle at Ludlow camp between strikers and the militia, who have mounted a machine gun atop a knoll. The fight lasts all day. The armed militia is reinforced later in the day with fresh guards.

Fires begin to sweep through the tent city at Ludlow.

Some women and children take shelter by hiding beneath the platform of a single tent. The tent catches fire.

Two women and 11 children suffocate to death in the pit below, which had been dug to give them a place of safety.

* * *

The reported death toll has varied, but it is believed that 26 people died at Ludlow camp that day, including a handful of militiamen. More days of violence followed. The federal government was eventually called in to stop the bloodshed when dozens more miners and militiamen were killed in skirmishes in the days after the Ludlow massacre.

But it is perhaps the sorry deaths of two women and 11 children that has seared into the minds of American citizens in the hundred years since. The site of the killings is now a U.S. National Historic Landmark. The events at Ludlow camp are commemorated as a turning point in American labor relations. Needed reforms were finally enacted, though the mine workers’ union did not prevail in its demands at the time. The strike ended in December, 1914. In the aftermath, labor organizer Mary Harris Jones, known as “Mother” Jones, met with John D. Rockefeller Jr. He and other mine owners then made efforts to upgrade safety and comfort of workers.

There are many events planned in Colorado to commemorate the Ludlow Massacre (SEE LIST BELOW), but there are two to note:

Sunday, April 20, 20142 p.m. – Prayer vigil, Agape Service by St. John Greek Orthodox Church of Pueblo
LOCATION: Ludlow National Historic Landmark, 180 miles south of Denver, one-half mile west of Exit 27 off Interstate 25, Ludlow.

Sunday, May 18, 201411 a.m. – UMWA 100th Anniversary Commemorative Service (held on this date because the anniversary date this year, April 20, is Easter Sunday)
LOCATION: Ludlow National Historic Landmark, 180 miles south of Denver, one-half mile west of Exit 27 off Interstate 25, Ludlow.

Many thanks to authors Amy Zimmer and Jenny Shank and fine arts critic Ray Rinaldi for fascinating presentations on “City as Muse: How Denver Stirs Creativity,” on Wednesday, April 2, 2014! The slide shows and talks were varied, interesting and just so… Denver! Thanks to our readers for joining us.

Author Amy B. Zimmer knows old homes. Denver and its architecture are her passions. Her latest book, Denver’s Historic Homes, reveals the history of the city through its significant residential architecture.

Ray Rinaldi is the fine arts critic for The Denver Post, reviewing art and architecture, classical music and dance performances with discerning eyes. A veteran writer and editor, he’s originally from Philadelphia and was a fellow with the National Arts Journalism Program at Columbia University. His skill in interpreting artists’ aims is eye-opening for the rest of us. You’ve seen his videos, read his critiques, now meet him in person and hear what he really thinks of Denver!

Coors Field (RJ Sangosti, Denver Post)

Jenny Shank’s first novel, The Ringer (Permanent Press, 2011), won the High Plains Book Award in fiction and was a finalist for the Mountains & Plains Independent Booksellers Association’s Reading the West Award. Her book weaves a fictional tale of intertwined lives based on actual events in the news.

“The Ringer,” a novel by Jenny Shank

Jenny grew up in Denver and earned degrees from the University of Notre Dame and the University of Colorado. She is currently a Mullin Scholar in writing at the University of Southern California and lives in Boulder with her family. Her stories, essays, satire and reviews have appeared in The Atlantic, The Guardian, McSweeney’s, The McSweeney’s Book of Politics and Musicals, Poets & Writers Magazine, The Onion, Prairie Schooner, and Alaska Quarterly Review. Find out how Denver structures this author’s writing and becomes part of the story.

Our thanks to Christopher W. Lane and The Philadelphia Print Shop West for presenting an intriguing program Tuesday night. Our full-house audience learned just how accurate the early sketches of Denver’s streets really are. Our thanks also to our readers and audience. Mark your calendars for April 2 to attend another Denver Post presentation!

* * *

Our program is ON for tonight, Tuesday, March 11, despite a light spring snow. We have covered parking on site at The Denver Post building at 15th & Cleveland Place OR via the Broadway side of the building. We look forward to seeing our audience at the scheduled 6 p.m. start!

* * *

What did Denver look like in the 19th century? According to antique prints and maps, it was a pioneer town with rough streets but lots of lively action! Join us on Tuesday, March 11, at 6 p.m. when The Denver Post hosts an event onsite to share some beautiful artists’ renditions of daily life on the plains.

Christopher W. Lane

Our expert, Christopher W. Lane, of The Philadelphia Print Shop West in Cherry Creek North will be here to explain how these depictions were created and why they are so important to understanding Denver’s early days. He is a long-time dealer in antique prints and maps and has been an appraiser on the PBS TV show Antiques Roadshow since 1997.

The image at top, which shows cattle, porkers and citizens moseying along Blake Street in what is now lower downtown Denver, is by Alfred Edward Mathews:“Blake Street, Denver, Colorado.” From Pencil Sketches of Colorado, Its Cities, Principal Towns and Mountain Scenery. New York: A.E. Mathews, 1866. Tinted lithograph by J. Bien. 9 3/4 x 16.

She’s oh-so-elderly. In fact she’s the second oldest lady in the deployable U.S. Navy fleet. But she does her job. This time, the amphibious transport dock ship USS Denver (LPD 9) has shoved off from Sasebo, Japan, to take her place with the U.S. Navy’s 7th Fleet patrolling the Pacific and participating in exercises with the Thai navy.

She was christened in January, 1965 by Ann Love, wife of Colorado Governor John A. Love. In the photo below, Mrs. Love smashes a traditional bottle of champagne onto the bow of The USS Denver before its launch in Seattle, Washington.

Christening of USS Denver in 1965

The USS Denver played an historic role in Vietnam War history during the evacuation of Saigon, in April 1975. U.S. Navy ships of all sizes intercepted boats filled with South Vietnamese refugees fleeing Saigon ahead of the North Vietnamese troops swooping into the city.

Here she is in 1984, underway in an aerial starboard bow view taken by official U.S. Navy photographers:

USS Denver in 1984

Below, troops from the 1st Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment onboard the USS Denver prepare to disembark during a training exercise in 1995.

Just as they have been for aaalll the other Broncos’ appearances at Super Bowls of the past (six), Denver football fans are showing their support of the team for Super Bowl XLVIII on February 2, 2014.

Young and old, new and long-time fans come together to party, cheer their heroes and revel in victory. So, here’s to the fans of the Denver Broncos, who never really leave the stadium…

1978 Super Bowl fans cheer Broncos

In the photo above, fans cheer the Broncos on TV at the London House Restaurant as the team starts a play in the 1978 Super Bowl (XII). The Broncos lost a heart-breaker to the Dallas Cowboys, 27-10, who were led by star quarterback Roger Staubach. Quarterback Craig Morton led the Broncos in a frustrating game of catch-up all the way.

Broncos ‘cheerleaders’ spoof Elway with ‘Johnny Angel’ rendition.

Above, the hype for the 1987 Super Bowl appearance by the Broncos got imaginative, with “Kathy and the Cheerleaders” doing a salute to John Elway with a no-doubt sparkling rendition of “Oh Johnny Angel… how I love him…” etc., etc.
Quarterback Elway made his first Super Bowl appearance in XXI in Pasadena, Calif. The loss to the New York Giants at 39-20 was a tough one.

Fans catch an October, 1987 game at old Mile High Stadium.

Elway brought the Broncos back for another Super Bowl appearance in 1988 (XXII). His three young wide receivers, The Three Amigos, were a popular trio (Vance Johnson, Mark Jackson & Ricky Nattiel). But the party was short-lived as the Broncos fell 42-10 to the Washington Redskins.

Fans of the Three Amigos in 1988 playoffs.

In 1990, they tried again in Super Bowl XXIV, but took a crushing blow from The San Francisco 49ers, losing at 55-10.

Ah! But the NEXT Super Bowl appearance in 1998 (XXXII) might just prove to be a memorable one…

Colorado fans drove to San Diego and partied in the parking lot.

The fans above drove from Colorado to San Diego to be part of the scene at Super Bowl XXXII when the Denver Broncos outplayed the Green Bay Packers 31-24 on January 25, 1998, giving John Elway his, and the Broncos’, first Super Bowl victory.

Could they possibly do it again, asked fans? COULD they?? Just watch…

In 1999, the Denver Broncos pulled off an amazing repeat of their first victory, defeating the Atlanta Falcons in Super Bowl XXXIII with a 34-19 score. A joyous team and fans celebrated mightily, like it was 1999!

Quarterback John Elway celebrates.

That year, the fans’ beloved quarterback retired from football after 16 years of play, five Super Bowl appearances and back-to-back championships in his final two years.

Here’s to all the Denver Broncos fans, who, win or lose, stand by their team year after year.

Concerned fans in 1979 weathered any temperatures.

Fans love to tailgate in parking lot.

And, now that the 7th Super Bowl appearance of the Denver Broncos is out of the way, an expert has assessed the team’s performance. After careful deliberation and consideration of the film of the game, he delivers:

The biggest blizzard known hit Denver a century ago, in the first days of December, 1913. The snowstorm of historic proportions swooped over Colorado and other western states, leaving a devastating crust of heavy snow 45.7 inches deep in the city.

Front page, December 5, 1913

By Friday, December 5, the city was clambering from under its white mantle, trying to get back to business. Hilarious headlines of the day read, “Schools Are All Closed Until Safety Reigns!” and “Mantle of Shimmering White Stops Activity And Everybody Jollifies!”

The Denver Post, rarely to be accused of understatement, published its “SOUVENIR EDITION OF THE DAY OF THE BIG STORM” and whipped up headlines such as:
“No trains… No Schools… No Taxis, No Mails, No Noises, No Deliveries, No Funerals, Nothing But Snow, Snow, Snow and Still Falling…”

Trolley car trundles up 16th St.

The photo above, taken the morning of December 6, shows a few people trudging through knee-deep drifts at 16th and Welton Streets. The city tramway trolley car seems unhindered. The Daniels and Fisher tower is visible in the distance.

Today, most people have experienced a big snowstorm or two, but it may be difficult to imagine how paralyzing a blizzard can be; the amount of snowfall coupled with fierce winds creates drifts that can bury livestock, farmhouses, roads, trains, streets, building entries and vehicles.

“Guard Your Coal Bin” brays a headline. “Downtown stores, hospitals, city institutions are cold today. They find themselves with a limited supply of coal on hand and are forced to be sparing in its use. Every person in Denver who has not at least a week’s supply should watch every pound of coal.”

There was further worry about poor people who could not get out of their homes to buy a few more lumps of coal.

But the main civic problem in 1913 became evident as snow removal got underway. Where, oh where, to put it all?

Man walks in snow removal dump area.

Any open space became a target for dumping of tons of snow removed from city streets. In the photo below, the state Capitol building can be seen, showing an open area not far from today’s Civic Center Park. Horses and mule teams and wagons, still in common use, were employed for days, clearing up walkways and roads.

Snow removal, 1913 blizzard

The photo below shows that even days afterward, snow removal activity is ongoing on 16th Street in downtown Denver, when sidewalks are clear but only a center track of the street is yet passable.

Wagon teams tackle snow removal.

However, in mountain communities, the situation was more dire. Up to 60″ of snow had fallen in some Colorado communities, as the photo below shows. This is a shot of the corner of Main and Eureka Streets in Central City. Weeks would go by before any regular transportation routes could be renewed.